


Find a home, or make one

by sirona



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Domestic, Family, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-26
Updated: 2012-09-26
Packaged: 2017-11-15 02:17:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/522071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirona/pseuds/sirona
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"No, no, swear to God," Darcy avows gleefully. "The look on that guy's face, and that was when he was telling this at the <i>bar</i>. Imagine Thor marching into his <i>shop</i> and demanding a horse."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Find a home, or make one

**Author's Note:**

> Just something extremely short and sweet, because I had that visual in my head and it wouldn't go away. :'))) Also I _really_ wanted Clint using that line. /sap

"Good evening, Agent Coulson. Welcome home."

"Thanks, Jarvis," Phil says, not quite managing to stop the weariness from colouring his voice. It has been an _appallingly_ frustrating day babysitting a group of MI6 representatives who looked like the paperwork clones everyone assumes Phil emulates. He's tired, and he's looking forward to changing into sweats and following his nose to the top floor of the Tower, where by now someone is bound to be tentatively poking around the stove in the hopes for food. 

Jarvis' soothing voice succeeds in derailing the plans somewhat. "Agent Barton, Ms Lewis and Mr Stark are in the Stark floor kitchen. They asked me to notify them when you returned."

Phil sighs, but it's more pleased than pissed -- it always is these days, especially around this group of people. "Take me all the way up then, Jarvis."

He hears the sounds of mirth before the doors of the elevator have even opened. Down the short corridor, he can hear Clint and Tony laughing semi-hysterically at some story Darcy's regaling them with.

"You have got to be shitting me," Clint gasps, sounding hoarse. Tony's giggles have reached the level of breathless that implies they have been going on for some time, and are starting to make his gut cramp.

"No, no, swear to God," Darcy avows gleefully. "The look on that guy's face, and that was when he was telling this at the _bar_. Imagine Thor marching into his _shop_ and demanding a horse."

The giggles are back again, accompanied by the creaking complaints of wooden furniture. When Phil makes it around the corner of the open-plan kitchen, he finds Clint hanging back in his chair, tipped until it's swaying on two legs. His head is thrown back to bare the smooth column of his throat to the room, and his eyes are tightly squeezed around tears of hilarity. Tony has his head pillowed on his arms, shoulders shaking. Darcy is grinning like the fiend she is; she catches Phil's eye and winks at him. It's not like Phil hasn't read the report she is enacting, but there's something about the faux-grave expression on her face when she speaks that cracks even him up.

"So the guy's like, 'We don't have horses. We have cats, dogs, birds.' And Thor, bless him, apparently just looked at him and said," and here Darcy schools her face and makes her voice deeper, a rumble low in her throat, and mimics,"'Then give me one of those large enough to ride.'"

Clint and Tony _howl_ with laughter. Tony starts banging his hand on the table, curled in two and wheezing like breathing is painful, which, it probably is, but clearly Tony doesn't care. Clint actually does that little shriek-snort that means he can barely breathe himself; his face is a deep pink, and Phil can't quite tear his eyes away from the way his stomach flexes under his thin t-shirt. Phil loves this, so much. He loves these people, his team; he loves the trust, the camaraderie, loves knowing that there isn't one of them that could be accused of being 'normal', and that to them, that's perfectly wonderful. Loves that they can take the time from waging war on forces wanting to destroy the planet and humanity both to be this, to remember what, whom they're fighting for -- each other.

"I can't," Tony grunts, "I can't, oh god this is too good. I'm going to build that dork a robot bird or dog or cat or rabbit or something he can ride, see if I don't."

Even Darcy clutches at her stomach and roars with laughter at the visual. Clint wipes at his eyes, still giggling helplessly, his whole body moving with it, face shining with joy. Phil feels his still-healing chest constrict a little, from the sheer depth of the affection he feels for him.

"Hiya, boss," Darcy says with a winning smile just then, and Clint tips his chair back some more to look at Phil upside-down with a goofy grin on his face. Tony tilts his forehead along the table so he's looking sideways at Phil, smirking like a loon.

"Just promise me one thing," Phil says levelly, and the three of them get a sheepish look in their eyes, as if they expect trouble, which, why would Phil break up family time to bust their chops? Honestly, he thought they knew him better by now. "Promise me I'll be the one who gets to tell Director Fury and show him the photographs."

And wouldn't you know it, that sets them off all over again. 

"That's my man," Clint manages in between guffaws. "Oh god Phil please tell me you still have that mini camera you can fix to the lapel on your jacket."

"I'll build him a new one," Tony promises, choking on a giggle. "A better one, oh god, is it Christmas? It feels like fucking Christmas."

Of course it does. Their family is all here, safe, happy; any minute now Natasha is going to emerge and demand to be let in on the joke, and will very likely crack one of her all-too-rare proper smiles, and Thor will shout with laughter and insist on re-enacting the scene properly for the benefit of those who were missing the first time round. Steve's eyes will pinch, like they do when he's trying hard not to laugh, and then he'll catch Bruce's eye and give in, and Thor will stand there, tall and proud, and decide he needs Jane to corroborate his story and will rush off to call her immediately, leaving the others to try and catch their breaths before the feeding frenzy part of their evening ensues.

Yeah. Phil loves his life so damn much.


End file.
